Abstract

This paper analyses promises made by companies to various publics, including global investors, national public administrative bodies and local populations. We speak of ‘promise engineering’ to describe both the integration of the making of promises in mining exploration operations and the attempted articulation of promises made to different publics with different concerns. We focus on the French ‘mining revival’, which prompted exploration projects that became controversial and were integrated into a government-led approach meant to introduce an objective of ‘responsibility’ in mining operations. Mining junior companies attempted to make promises that were both technical and social, while responsibility proved consistent with the crucial role of financial investment. We show that promise engineering offers an analytical lens for studying anticipation practices in industrial projects and the opposition these projects face.

摘要

本文分析了公司对各种公众的承诺，包括全球投资者、国家公共行政机构和当地民众。我们所说的“承诺工程”既描述了在采矿勘探作业中做出承诺的整合，也描述了向具有不同关注点的不同公众做出的承诺的尝试性表达。我们专注于法国的“采矿复兴”，它引发了引起争议的勘探项目，并被整合到政府主导的方法中，旨在在采矿作业中引入“责任”的目标。矿业初级公司试图做出技术和社会方面的承诺，而责任证明与金融投资的关键作用是一致的。